As I’ve noted before—but you may be new here—different Factions in Monsterpocalypse are released in different ways. The “big launch” Factions usually have a couple of months of releases to get them up to speed compared to those that have come before. Then there are the “original 6” that were released over a longer period of time but were the majority of the releases in the first year of the game, so they filled out in a relatively quick way. Lastly, there are the “trickle” Factions. These models are squeezed into the release schedule when I want to break things up a bit, and they let us expand the two Agendas in interesting ways. They also let us explore new ideas, like Sgt. Titanica and Gallamaxus, in a more limited way than a big block of releases.
The most recently released model, Leviathron, is from one of these trickle Factions. Another classic monster from the previous edition, this release lets anyone who loves the Tritons Faction to play a two-monster game with these giant sea creatures for the first time.
It also provides some interesting list-building options, as a unit pack of Tritons came out a few months ago. When designing a new monster, one of the first questions we usually discuss is if it should synergize with a particular unit or if it will be more independent. Many monsters give a bonus of some kind to Faction units in your force, and a few give bonuses to any allied model you pair them with. When first working on the Tritons, I decided to start with Krakenoctus. Since a release date for Triton units was not firm at that time, and we knew it would be a significant amount of time between the two releases, it made the most sense to make the first Tritons monster independent. When starting on Leviathron’s design, we had firm release dates for the Steel Shell Crabs and Psi-eels, so it made sense to build some synergies into the big fish.
I didn’t start with the synergy rule, though. When looking at the model, it was obvious it needed a rule to represent being covered entirely in armor. We already had some monsters that are heavily armored, but I wanted to go with a different angle for Leviathron. The first stat I put into the database was Health 14. As you can see on the card, that got tuned a little during playtest. We settled on 13 Health, making this the biggest amount in the game.
A bunch of Health wasn’t quite enough for me when it came to how solid the model should be, so we added the Bulwark rule. In a game like Monsterpocalypse, where line of sight is super simplified, subtle adjustments to it can be really interesting. An attacker who wants to shoot past Leviathron is going to have to do a little more work, making this a very low-key synergy that any ally can utilize. After all that, we created a core Faction synergy: King Tide represents the tidal wave this monster pushes in front of it as it rises from the sea. The ability allows the Steel Shell Crabs to be more offensive in both grabbing territory and attacking your opponent. And with this speed boost, Psi-eels become a more serious threat that your opponent will have to work harder to counter.
Offensively, we had to represent those giant teeth, so Leviathron got the Crunch rule. This gives Leviathron a way to do more damage in Alpha, where most monsters don’t, but it’s very unpredictable. Finally, to represent those giant fin-hands and to up the offensive power a bit more, we gave him Chain Reaction on the brawl attack.
After all of those abilities, we adjusted the Speed and Defense on this side of the card lower than average. This represents that the monster doesn’t get around that well on land and isn’t very dodgy, and it also helps to balance the high health and bonus to units.
Once Leviathron goes Hyper, things get a little more straightforward. The first thing we did was drop King Tide. This is pretty standard. Most monsters focus on attacking the enemy monsters when they go Hyper, but we also wanted to make sure the ability wasn’t too powerful. We also upped both the SPD and DEF stats to something more average. Offensively, Precision Strike on the brawl attack makes Crunch a little more likely but doesn’t push this monster into a super offensive role, preserving his defensive theme. Lastly, Penetrator and a good Boost Die stat on the power attack makes power attacks really reliable, giving Leviathron a solid way to do damage in the late game.
Leviathron has been out for a little while now. Why not pick him up today and round out your Tritons force!
